Solomon Goes Before Yahweh

Now Solomon the son of David strengthened himself over his kingdom, and Yahweh his God was with him and highly exalted him.

Then Solomon and all the assembly with him went to the high place which was at Gibeon, for God’s tent of meeting was there, which Moses the servant of Yahweh had made in the wilderness.

Now the bronze altar, which Bezalel the son of Uri, the son of Hur, had made, was there before the tabernacle of Yahweh, and Solomon and the assembly sought it out.

And Solomon went up there before Yahweh to the bronze altar which was at the tent of meeting, and offered one thousand burnt offerings on it.

Now, O Yahweh God, let Your promise to my father David endure, for You have made me king over a people as numerous as the dust of the earth.

Yahweh’s House Will Be Great

Then Solomon decided to build a house for the name of Yahweh and a royal palace for himself.

Behold, I am about to build a house for the name of Yahweh my God, setting it apart to Him as holy, to burn fragrant incense before Him and to set out the showbread continually, and to offer burnt offerings morning and evening, on sabbaths and on new moons and on the appointed feasts of Yahweh our God, this being required forever in Israel.

Covenant with Huram King of Tyre

Then Huram king of Tyre said in a letter sent to Solomon: “Because Yahweh loves His people, He has given you to be king over them.”

Then Huram said, “Blessed be Yahweh, the God of Israel, who has made heaven and earth, who has given King David a wise son, knowledgeable in insight and understanding, who will build a house for Yahweh and a royal palace for himself.

Solomon Builds Yahweh’s House

Then Solomon began to build the house of Yahweh in Jerusalem on Mount Moriah, where Yahweh had appeared to his father David, at the place that David had prepared on the threshing floor of Ornan the Jebusite.

The Furnishings of the House of Yahweh

Then he made a bronze altar, twenty cubits in length and twenty cubits in width and ten cubits in height.

And the pots and the shovels and the flesh hooks and all its utensils, Huram-abi made of polished bronze for King Solomon for the house of Yahweh.

The Ark Brought into the House of Yahweh

Thus all the work that Solomon did for the house of Yahweh was finished. And Solomon brought in the things set apart as holy by his father David, even the silver and the gold and all the utensils, and he put them in the treasuries of the house of God.

Then Solomon assembled the elders of Israel and all the heads of the tribes, the leaders of the fathers’ households of the sons of Israel to Jerusalem, to bring up the ark of the covenant of Yahweh from the city of David, which is Zion.

Then the priests brought the ark of the covenant of Yahweh to its place, into the inner sanctuary of the house, to the Holy of Holies, under the wings of the cherubim.

There was nothing in the ark except the two tablets which Moses put there at Horeb, where Yahweh cut a covenant with the sons of Israel, when they came out of Egypt.

The Glory of Yahweh Fills His House

Now it happened that when the priests came out of the holy place (for all the priests who were present had sanctified themselves, without regard to divisions),

in unison when the trumpeters and the singers were to make themselves heard with one voice to praise and to give thanks to Yahweh, and when they lifted up their voice accompanied by trumpets and cymbals and instruments of music, and when they praised Yahweh saying, “He indeed is good for His lovingkindness endures forever,” then the house, the house of Yahweh, was filled with a cloud,

so that the priests could not stand to minister because of the cloud, for the glory of Yahweh filled the house of God.

Solomon Blesses the People

Then Solomon said, “Yahweh has said that He would dwell in the cloud of dense gloom.

And he said, “Blessed be Yahweh, the God of Israel, who spoke with His mouth to my father David and has fulfilled it by His hands, saying,

And it was in the heart of my father David to build a house for the name of Yahweh, the God of Israel.

But Yahweh said to my father David, ‘Because it was in your heart to build a house for My name, you did well that it was in your heart.

And Yahweh has established His word which He spoke; and I have been established in place of my father David and sit on the throne of Israel, as Yahweh promised, and have built the house for the name of Yahweh, the God of Israel.

And there I have set the ark in which is the covenant of Yahweh, which He cut with the sons of Israel.”